


I have spent all my years in believing you

by ImpishTubist



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Fluff, Sickfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-22
Updated: 2020-01-22
Packaged: 2021-02-27 05:21:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,343
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22361755
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ImpishTubist/pseuds/ImpishTubist
Summary: It turns out that retired demons make terrible patients, and that retired angels aren’t the best nursemaids.Somehow, they muddle through.
Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 8
Kudos: 137





	I have spent all my years in believing you

**Author's Note:**

> This is from a prompt someone sent me on Tumblr months ago, where I was asked to work the line “You’re so cute when you’re sick and needy” into a fic. I...did my best. 
> 
> Title comes from Queen's "Somebody To Love".

Aziraphale had admired humans from the start. Had liked them well enough to give them his flaming sword for protection, had observed them with fascination through the millennia. He  _ loved  _ them, the way he loved all creatures on this planet, even the ones who tried to purchase his beloved books. It was his  _ job _ , it was in his nature. Love for all things, great and small.

He even had love for insufferable demons who were no longer demons; demons who were mostly-human now, like Aziraphale was. Almost-human, still-immortal, not-quite demons who were currently sprawled across his couch and moaning pitifully between hacking coughs.

“M’dying, angel.” 

“You are not  _ dying _ ,” Aziraphale said shortly, “and I am no longer an angel. Up, if you please.” 

He pressed Crowley’s shoulder, and Crowley miserably--but obligingly--lifted himself up long enough for Aziraphale to stuff a couple of pillows behind his back, and then he slumped back down again.

“How do humans  _ ssssstand  _ this?” he hissed. Some habits died hard, it seemed, including his tendency to hiss when he was under stress--or really, when he was feeling  _ any  _ emotion to a great extent. 

“The Almighty only knows,” Aziraphale sighed. “What was your temperature?” 

“Thirty-eight-five,” Crowley muttered. The thermometer lay abandoned on the table, and Aziraphale was reluctant to touch it. He knew how quickly illness passed from human to human--then again, Crowley was already in his bookshop, and they were breathing the same air. Aziraphale was likely to fall ill now anyway, no matter what he did. The thought was terrifying, now that he no longer had the ability to miracle it away.

“Well, that’s better than it was,” he said bracingly, though it wasn’t by much. “Would you like some tea?”

Crowley’s face contorted. “Ugh. No.” 

“Some water?” 

“No.”

“A book?” Aziraphale was grasping at straws now, but honestly, how was  _ he  _ supposed to know what to do with a sick almost-human, formerly-occult being? He was still trying to figure out how his  _ own  _ mostly-human body worked, let alone someone else’s. 

“Nah.”

“Well, then,” Aziraphale said, a little desperately, “I’ll be in the back room if you need--”

“ _ No _ .” Long, slender fingers encircled his wrist. “Don’ leave.” 

“Look, my dear,” he said, flustered, “ _ despite _ how cute you are when you’re sick and needy, I really must--” 

Crowley lifted his head. “I am?”

“No,” Aziraphale sighed. “Honestly, you’re a pain in the arse.”

“You said  _ arse _ ,” Crowley giggled, and Aziraphale resisted the urge to bury his face in his hands.

“Crowley,” he said tightly, “what do you  _ want  _ from me?” 

Crowley frowned for a moment, thinking hard, and then said, “A kiss?”

“A  _ what _ ?” Aziraphale sputtered. 

“You know, it’s when--”

“I know what a kiss is, Crowley!” 

“It makes humans feel better,” Crowley said stubbornly. “S’like medicine.”

“ _ You _ ,” Aziraphale said, “have had entirely too much of that Nightquill--”

“NyQuil.”

“Whatever!” Aziraphale snapped. “It’s making you--you’re speaking nothing but nonsense. Sleep it off.” 

“Yeah,” Crowley said after a pause, sounding suddenly dejected. The fingers vanished from his wrist, and Aziraphale missed them at once. “Nonsense. You’re right. I’ll jus’...sleep.”

“It’s for the best, my dear,” Aziraphale said, softening his voice slightly, aware that he had done  _ something _ wrong and unsure of how to fix it. “You’ll feel better in the morning.” 

****

Somehow, Crowley looked worse in the morning, but had managed a shower while Aziraphale slept and now lay huddled under three blankets, alternating between shivering and sweating. Aziraphale brought him more medicine, forced a glass of water into him, and put  _ The Golden Girls  _ on the television. He’d read on the Internet that watching shows one liked while sick was a way to comfort, to soothe, to pass the time. He checked Crowley’s temperature, and was at once heartened and dismayed to see that it had come down slightly. It still wasn’t what humans considered  _ normal _ , and therefore his fever hadn’t yet broken. How much longer was this going to take?

And then a terrible thought seized him, that it would never break, that Crowley would slowly get worse until he  _ did  _ discorporate, and it wasn’t as though Hell would be inclined to give him a new body, and then Aziraphale would be left all alone in this godforsaken vessel on this godforsaken planet--

He closed his eyes, shocked at the thoughts that crossed his mind unbidden. He  _ loved  _ this planet, he did, and all of humanity, but the idea of enduring an entire lifetime here without Crowley…

Too-warm fingers touched his hand, and Aziraphale’s eyes flew open to meet Crowley’s--no longer serpent eyes, not since the almost-Armageddon, but still an unnatural shade of yellow-gold. Aziraphale missed those eyes. 

“Angel,” he murmured. 

“Stop that,” Aziraphale said, sharper than he intended. “It isn’t kind, you  _ know  _ I’m not--I’m not that anymore.”

A heavy silence fell. After a moment, Crowley sighed.

“For Hell’s sake, Aziraphale, I don’t call you that because it’s what you  _ are _ ,” he said. “I haven’t for millennia.” 

Aziraphale blinked at him. He truly was beautiful, even like this, all glassy-eyed and flushed-cheek and damp with sweat. 

“What do you mean?”

“Oh, for--surely you aren’t  _ that  _ dense.” Crowley glared at him, but the effect was somewhat spoiled by the colorful quilted blankets he had pulled up to his chin. 

“I seem to remember someone shouting at me in the middle of a  _ very  _ crowded street that I was  _ stupid _ ,” Aziraphale snapped. “So, yes, I believe I am  _ that dense _ .” 

“I didn’t mean that, angel,” Crowley said quietly. “I was angry. And…”

His mouth closed around the word.

“Scared?”

“Yeah.” 

“You weren’t the only one who was frightened.” But Aziraphale softened as the familiar guilt took hold, and his anger leeched away. “I’m sorry, you know. I should’ve known--well, it was foolish of me to think that Heaven would even care, to believe that they wanted to avert the Apocalypse.”

Crowley’s hand grabbed his, holding on fast. “Don’t apologize for having faith, angel.  _ Never  _ be sorry for that. It’s one of the things I’ve always liked about you.” 

“Well, I’m afraid you’ll have to find something else about me to like, seeing as I don’t have much of that faith anymore,” Aziraphale said, and even he was surprised at the bitterness in his voice. 

“Are you kidding me right now?” Crowley’s eyes were wide and imploring. “You can’t  _ possibly  _ think that I have to struggle to come up with things that I lo--that I  _ like  _ about you. Honestly, Azir--”

His entire body jerked, gripped by yet another violent coughing fit. Aziraphale sat there, helplessly rubbing his hand in a circle on Crowley’s back as the fit wracked his thin frame. His fingers twitched, itching to perform the miracle he was no longer able to, and he bit back a whimper of frustration. How  _ did  _ humans stand this? 

Eventually, the coughing eased. Crowley sagged against him, his heavy head coming to rest on Aziraphale’s shoulder. Aziraphale couldn’t bring himself to care all that much, really. In for a penny, wasn’t that how the saying went? And if he fell ill, Crowley would take care of him, and that really wasn’t an unpleasant prospect.

“You were too good for the lot of them,” Crowley muttered, voice scraped raw. “Now they can’t touch you. M’glad of that. I like you as you are.”

“Just enough of a bastard?”

Crowley snorted. “Something like that.” 

He yawned and huddled closer. Aziraphale put an arm around his shoulders, squeezing him gently. He let his cheek rest on Crowley’s red hair, more wildly unkempt than usual. 

“I don’t suppose,” he said, “that offer of a kiss is still on the table.” 

“It’s been on the table for six thousand years now, it’s not like it’s going anywhere.” 

Aziraphale closed his eyes.  _ Oh, dear.  _ He really had been obtuse, hadn’t he? 

“In that case,” he said, stroking Crowley’s hair, “when you’re feeling better, I have a  _ lot  _ to make up for.” 

He felt Crowley’s grin against his shoulder. “I’m going to hold you to that, angel.” 


End file.
